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Alcoholic Mother
18/f
My family is in a tough situation.
My mom has been drinking since I was in 8th grade. It was never this bad though. Before, she would always drink and get drunk but it'd only last a few weeks until my dad made her throw it out.
Then eventually she'll start hiding it.
But now, she is drunk all day and all night for about 5 months. I left for college in another state though.
As of right now, she's been living with this other man, cheating on my dad. She's there because that guy will give her all the alcohol she wants. My dad is mad of course, but they've been married for 20 years and he loves her and cares about her and wants to help her. She's a really good lady but it's the drinking that screwed her up.
Whenever she's here, she lies all the time and just picks fights with my dad. She is still living in the past, bringing up things that happened along time ago but is no longer a problem.
Even my aunt came over and my mom was bringing up things when they were kids that bothered her.
So there are many things she has been holding onto.
My younger brother, he's 16, he's in juvi right now for running away, stealing a car, drunk driving, hit and run. She blames him for her drinking. But when things were ok with him, she was still doing it.
So obviously, if she wanted to get help, she would but she doesn't want it. She told us she knows she has a problem but she can fix it herself.
She was looking up videos to stop but she said she doesn't have enough will power.
I'm not going back to college this semester so that I can stay with my dad.
He's planning on moving so that my mom can get away from this guy because right now, that's the only way she can drink and so my brother can get away from the drugs and his friends here. But right now, we're looking to help her.
We've tried an intervention type thing but that didn't work. Some other family members have talked to her too.
She won't go to rehab and she used to go to some AA meetings but that didn't work.
I know she has to want it but there has to be something else we can do.
I can't just be patient because it's been going on for too long. She needs help or she can die.
Someone told me about hypnosis. That would cost about 1,200 if it works. We would just have to convince her to go.
My dad found some CDs online and saw good reviews.
The thing is, she needs real help and me and my dad don't know what can work.
If you know anyone who has been like this and know what helped them please let me know.
I know other people who were alcoholics but they were never this bad. No one I know has ever been in a situation like this.
Thanks for the help!
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Hey, I know you are worried about your mom, and I know you are worried about the situation between her and your dad.
But listen:
You can't do ANYTHING for her. Sorry. She has to do for herself. She has to admit to herself that she doesn't have the willpower to quit, and she needs to enter rehab.
Nothing you mentioned wanting to do for her will work for her, because she has to want those things for herself. You can't want it for her. It doesn't work that way.
WHY OH WHY are you NOT GOING TO SCHOOL??
Your dad is a big boy, and can take care of himself. You can't let your mother's alcoholism cause you to put off bettering your life and preparing for your future, and you certainly can't be a saving grace for their marriage. To be quite honest, their marital problems are their problems and their business. Your dad needs to work through that on his own. I'm shocked that he would even think to agree to you putting off school to stay with him. I'm not saying he's a bad guy or anything, but perhaps his emotions from the marital problems have got him not putting priorities where they should lie.
GO TO SCHOOL.
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Here's the thing. You can't help her if she won't help herself. She has to want to stop or all your efforts will be for nothing.
Moving will not help, you cannot hide her from alcohol forever. (and same with your brother, he will just find new friends and continue to use drugs unless he wants to change.) Remember that she has a disease that has changed her brain chemistry.
Don't waste your money on the hypnosis, that kind of treatment mainly works by using the placebo effect- if your mom doesn't think it's going to work it probably won't.
I know it's incredibly hard, but you cannot live her life and make her choices for her.
What can you do? You can tell her how you feel (whether in person or in a letter)- remind her that you love her and are worried and don't want to lose her.
You can do research- there's lots of books, etc out there on treat for alcoholism. There are also lots of books to help family members of alcoholics. I highly suggest checking that out.
One of my favorite authors was an alcoholic for about twenty years and nearly drank himself to death. Here is a long quote from one of his books, 'This Is How':
"What has worked for me is to find something I wanted more than I wanted to drink, which was a f*ck of a lot.
This is less a decision than a discovery. And it's for this reason that not everybody will get sober.
My view that the way to stop drinking is to stop drinking is laughably simplistic on the surface. It's "Just say no."
It's also true. The way to stop drinking is to want sobriety more. And then when you feel a craving, feel the craving until it passes. But don't act on it- any more than you wouldn't kill somebody you feel like killing when they cut you off in traffic.
Just because you want something doesn't mean you have to have it.
...To stop drinking, you stop drinking. You pour it out right now. Everything else- all the books, the therapies, and programs- are merely hand-holding. They all strike to accomplish the same thing: to talk you into not drinking.
I'm saying, if you want to stop, you will. But most do not want to stop enough to actually stop. And until there's a medical fix, alcoholics will die as drunks.
But be successful at not drinking, a person needs to occupy the space in life drinking once filled with something more rewarding than the comfort and escape of alcohol. This is the thing you have to find.
The truth is that people who cannot stop drinking are people who, however guilty they may feel and however dire the consequences, have become so addicted to the drug and the experience that they prefer it to the remainder of their lives. While they may truly want to be sober, they want to drink more.
The myth that alcoholics are powerless and unable in any way to shape the outcome of their addiction is a fatal, deeply untruthful message. No alcoholic should ever feel powerless over alcohol.
Those who die were not powerless. They either chose alcohol or they slid passively into the inevitable outcome of drinking; they made a decision by choosing to take no new action. And it's this choice that results in death.
...You absolutely can stop drinking today, right now.
The question is only, do you want to be sober more than you want to drink?
Very few people can answer this question truthfully and reply, yes.
I hope you're one of them. Maybe you are.
I didn't think I was."
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Before your Dad decides to up and move away you both and any siblings need to get yourself to an
AL ANON meeting. I have taken some classes on
this and believe me, moving and putting a halt on your lives will NOT help.
If you move she will find some other way to drink. If she even went with you in the first place. Alcoholism is tough to kick. The average person will go to rehab & AA meeting 3 or 4 times before they fall far enough to hit rock bottom & take the help. IF they are lucky.
She cannot fix it herself. If she could she would have done so by now. What you & your family need to do is learn to live without guilt about HER problem. Don't put your lives on hold. Just try a meeting or two. Meet people living with the same problem. It will help you all.
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